Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#61

Post by CydeWeys » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:16 PM UTC

MockObject wrote: post #54

CydeWeys wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good point about heat waste disposal. That's why you almost always see nuclear reactors along lakes/rivers/oceans, which is bad for other reasons as we saw with Fukushima, and all of that hot water being released wreaks havoc with riparian/marine ecosystems. Nuclear has downsides beyond the most obvious one, that of the risk of fallout. > I think that fission is not a good fit for terrestrial power. Heh, it's even wo…

How is there "waste heat" in a power plant that is designed to produce heat?

... the power plant is designed to produce electricity, not to produce heat. If it was designed to produce heat then it wouldn't need the turbines.

The heat is waste. For the same power generation, you want to minimize the amount of waste heat as much as possible.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#62

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:17 PM UTC

manigandham wrote: post #59

dragonwriter wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One of the biggest operators is the US Navy which has been running reactors in military vessels for decades without incident. AFAICT, none publicly acknowledged since a bunch in the 1970s, but that may mean less than it seems since the US government has a history of covering up nuclear incidents for decades (like a whole slew at the Hanford site from the 1940s-1980s that weren't acknowledged until the 1980s.)

Hanford was for nuclear production, not power generation, and was created during the early days of nuclear weapons research. Modern reactors are in an entirely different league with an incredible safety record. [1] Considering how easy it is to detect nuclear failures and the consequences in a tightly-enclosed ship, it's unlikely that there are any serious incidents. It's clear that they're experience and technology…

> Hanford was for nuclear production, not power generation, and was created during the early days of nuclear weapons research.

I'm not saying that Hanford has the same risk profile as Naval reactors, I’m saying that it demonstrates that the US government has a propensity for covering up nuclear incidents that it can get away with covering up (note that it also acknowledged other incidents at Hanford in the decades it was concealing many of them), so the fact that it hasn't acknowledged any related to naval power generation since a bunch in the 1970s is absence of evidence of such incidents, but not reliable evidence of absence of such incidents.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#63

Post by toomuchtodo » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:18 PM UTC

epistasis wrote: post #35

brandmeyer wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the problem is that basic competency in design and construction logistics have been lost I don't think this is just a nuclear problem. This is a civil engineering problem more broadly. IMO, the exact same forces which make nuclear impractical now are also responsible for the horrific budget explosions and overruns in big projects all over the US.

Yes, I think you are right, and it's a damn shame because there are so many infrastructure projects that we desperately need: high speed rail, commuter trains, subways, inexpensive housing builds with high du/acre and walkable designs... My guess is that by the time we have regained any such capacity, renewable and storage will be cheaper than the thermodynamic process of harvesting heat and turning it into electrici…

While I think we need efficient housing designs, I don't think we need high speed rail and commuter trains in the US. As much of that functionality as possible should be replaced with internet connectivity. There is no reason to be spending enormous sums per mile when we can find ways to destroy demand for moving atoms instead of bits. The cheapest mile of high speed or commuter rails it the mile you didn't build.

Efficient homes, renewables, ubiquitous internet connectivity, and electric vehicles are going to be your targets as people spend more time at their homes and the trips they make can be electrified.

(the above comment is predicated on developing countries aging rapidly causing workers to leave the workforce, the quick uptake of remote work due to the pandemic forcing employers to learn how to support it, and data showing people fleeing cities for the suburbs and lower density living arrangements in general)

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#64

Post by epistasis » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:23 PM UTC

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #56

dv_dt wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renewables + storage is already cheaper than many workloads where natural gas peaker plants applied for short runs. The prices for nat gas plants is basically mature, while renewables and storage are on a manufacturing S-curve cost decline. Basically this means there will be expanding workloads where it makes no financial sense to use natural gas at all, let alone nuclear. It's a matter of when, and we should be acce…

I understand what you are saying, but extrapolate out further. If we have 50% renewables how many batteries will be required? It's a lot of batteries. These batteries require lots of material inputs (copper, lithium, lead, cobalt, etc., depending on the chemistry). I did the calculation a while ago and it convinced me that it is not possible to consume as much energy as we currently do and meet the need with battery…

Your calculations don't agree with the majority of what gets published in peer reviewed literature. Many different groups have come up with tunable models to match current energy consumption with renewable build from 80% to 100%, with tunable parameters to cost optimize. General consensus is that nuclear at a small percentage would help greatly. However these models tend to use cost curve estimates from 5 years ago, so they assume that nuclear is far cheaper than reality, and meanwhile wind solar and storage have been ourperforming their predicted cost curves.

I would be willing to bet a dollar that for 95% of the earth, a wind/solar/storage/hydro grid will be cheaper, use fewer toxic resources, and produce more excess energy than one that includes nuclear. Because once you don't plan for that baseload, you start overbuilding cheap solar and wind to give excess capacity. A renewables-based grid is one with excess unused capacity nearly all the time, and one that is right at capacity for ~week per year.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#65

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:29 PM UTC

ramshanker wrote: post #45

brandmeyer wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the problem is that basic competency in design and construction logistics have been lost I don't think this is just a nuclear problem. This is a civil engineering problem more broadly. IMO, the exact same forces which make nuclear impractical now are also responsible for the horrific budget explosions and overruns in big projects all over the US.

I believe civil engineering part of nuclear reactor is it's easiest parts.

It's a set of "normal" problems like welding pipes, made much harder by the need for zero defects.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#66

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:33 PM UTC

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #56

dv_dt wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renewables + storage is already cheaper than many workloads where natural gas peaker plants applied for short runs. The prices for nat gas plants is basically mature, while renewables and storage are on a manufacturing S-curve cost decline. Basically this means there will be expanding workloads where it makes no financial sense to use natural gas at all, let alone nuclear. It's a matter of when, and we should be acce…

I understand what you are saying, but extrapolate out further. If we have 50% renewables how many batteries will be required? It's a lot of batteries. These batteries require lots of material inputs (copper, lithium, lead, cobalt, etc., depending on the chemistry). I did the calculation a while ago and it convinced me that it is not possible to consume as much energy as we currently do and meet the need with battery…

UK is already at about 40% renewables right this second with only a very small amount of storage.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#67

Post by twojacobtwo » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:36 PM UTC

brandmeyer wrote: post #21

epistasis wrote: post #3

This article is more than three years old, but the story hasn't changed much. VC Summer was abandoned, leaving utility customers with massive bills. Vogtle soldiers on, but seems to be unlikely to finish. Nucleae's problems are not the politics, the problem is that basic competency in design and construction logistics have been lost. Plans get delivered to construction that are "unconstructable," but construction sol…

> the problem is that basic competency in design and construction logistics have been lost I don't think this is just a nuclear problem. This is a civil engineering problem more broadly. IMO, the exact same forces which make nuclear impractical now are also responsible for the horrific budget explosions and overruns in big projects all over the US.

As someone who left the field of Civil Engineering out of frustration with the state of the industry, I largely agree, but for a different reason.

I have noticed that there is something like "regulatory capture" in the construction industry now, but not by the same methods as most other industries. With giant, multi-national corps handling most large construction projects now, the QA/QC engineers are either incorporated directly into the company and thus never stop terrible practices, or they are there as a sub-contractor to the prime contractor and thus will be replaced for 'other reasons' if they give push back. It's now a push to the bottom for quality and the industry is going to hell quickly as the Engineers who value quality and ethics are slowly pushed out or forced to submit. If a small engineering company tries to stand up to one of these behemoth construction corps, the smaller company will either be blackballed behind the scenes (if they're lucky enough to be temporarily successful in their challenge) or the behemoth will lean on the nearest municipal gov't and say something along the lines of "We would love to finish this critical project, but we're being held up by this silly requirement and this silly engineer. (implied: Since we're on a Cost Plus contract) It's costing you X,XXX,XXX per day while we're held up. You should probably give us a way to get past this issue."

It would be funny if it weren't so sad. Civil Engineers are getting crapped on by both sides for increasing costs. They are blamed for holding things up with quality checks and at the same time for not doing enough to stop the terrible practices that result in long-term failures which end up increasing costs further. Payouts are going down for QA/QC companies and the pressure is constantly increasing to let things slide. The differences between a well-regulated project and an 'unregulated' (for all intents and purposes) project are shocking - you can feel (and see) an attitude of IDGAF from everyone on projects where it is known that the regulations don't REALLY apply.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#68

Post by jeffreyrogers » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:37 PM UTC

pjc50 wrote: post #66

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand what you are saying, but extrapolate out further. If we have 50% renewables how many batteries will be required? It's a lot of batteries. These batteries require lots of material inputs (copper, lithium, lead, cobalt, etc., depending on the chemistry). I did the calculation a while ago and it convinced me that it is not possible to consume as much energy as we currently do and meet the need with battery…

UK is already at about 40% renewables right this second with only a very small amount of storage.

Sorry, should have been clearer. I meant 50% solar/wind. It is because of peaker plants and because their renewables are often biomass, which just gets burned, so effectively functions as a peaker plant.

Edit: On reflection though, you may be right. I might have gone too low. The problem I'm trying to point out occurs when you don't have access to peaker plants. As long as there is enough peaker plant capacity you do not need much storage.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#69

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:37 PM UTC

irontinkerer wrote: post #58

brandmeyer wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the problem is that basic competency in design and construction logistics have been lost I don't think this is just a nuclear problem. This is a civil engineering problem more broadly. IMO, the exact same forces which make nuclear impractical now are also responsible for the horrific budget explosions and overruns in big projects all over the US.

I am not really familiar with the space, so please pardon the stupid question.. Why can't we use an affordable safe/competent reactor design from 30-40 years ago, and stamp that out at scale, rather than building a "new" model that results in failure?

Over the previous 30-40 years we found out what the safety problems with the old designs were. PWRs can fail badly if they run out of water or leak under pressure.

However, they're also the main type of reactor that actually got built and works.

Re: Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power (2017)

#70

Post by jeffreyrogers » Wed, Aug 05, 2020, 4:42 PM UTC

epistasis wrote: post #64

jeffreyrogers wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand what you are saying, but extrapolate out further. If we have 50% renewables how many batteries will be required? It's a lot of batteries. These batteries require lots of material inputs (copper, lithium, lead, cobalt, etc., depending on the chemistry). I did the calculation a while ago and it convinced me that it is not possible to consume as much energy as we currently do and meet the need with battery…

Your calculations don't agree with the majority of what gets published in peer reviewed literature. Many different groups have come up with tunable models to match current energy consumption with renewable build from 80% to 100%, with tunable parameters to cost optimize. General consensus is that nuclear at a small percentage would help greatly. However these models tend to use cost curve estimates from 5 years ago,…

Can you provide a link to some of that research, I'm not familiar with it, but am interested in reading it.

Edit: I think solar/wind prices are artificially low because they exist in a system with peaker plants. When you remove the peaker plants the solar/wind utilities have to internalize the cost of storage, which is currently being externalized on natural gas peaker plants.